Asian journalists seek values worth preserving

Serious discussion about our journalism values and how well our journalists and media outlets abide by them is all too rare. The same was true in Asia until thinking practitioners there realised that values they considered innate in their societies and their journalism were suffering from intrusion from the West and by creeping – perhaps vaulting – globalisation. Asians are not alone in protesting the Western media’s ignorance of any society’s values and ambitions but their own and condemned the “values of Western journalism” accordingly. But in trying to establish which values are Asian and why, and which of them are so much part of treasured society that they should be preserved, the Asians may be setting us a good example. After all, our values are not so different from theirs and the pressure on our journalism values is the same as on theirs; history and economics are changing both and we should be as aware of it as the Asians are.